Zozoraba
Salem was a simple fisherman. Every morning, he would sail out with his small wooden boat, knowing the waves as well as the palm of his hand, and speaking to the wind as if it were an old friend. But that day, the sea was different, as if it were angry-rising and falling without mercy.
Salem tried to resist, pulling his nets and steering hard, but the waves played with him as a child plays with a small ball, tossing him from crest to trough, until he lost all sense of direction. He thought his end had come, that the sea would swallow him as it had swallowed many before him.
But when he opened his eyes, he found himself lying on a soft sandy shore he had never seen before. The sun slipped between strange trees, their leaves broad and their fruits glowing in colors he had never known. Stunned, he heard the calls of birds with no names, and saw small footprints on the sand, as if someone had arrived before him.
He stepped cautiously inland, and the deeper he went, the more he felt this was no ordinary island. The air was heavier, and the silence too complete. In the heart of the island, he found a clear lake, and when he looked into its surface, he did not see his reflection as usual, but that of another man-older, with eyes shining like the sea.
Salem trembled, unable to turn away. The man in the water spoke with a voice only Salem could hear:
"The sea played with you to bring you here. You were not only searching for fish... you were searching for yourself."
Salem sat on the edge of the lake, lost in thought. Was this island a dream? Or a hidden gate to another world? The sea had not cast him ashore by chance-it knew that within him was a fisherman far greater than nets and fish: a fisherman searching for the lost meaning.
And from that day on, Salem was no longer just a fisherman of the sea... he became a fisherman of secrets.